Activists vow to stop badger culls

Activists have warned that they will take “direct action” in an attempt to stop pilot badger culls from going ahead in Somerset and Gloucestershire.

In a post on its website, badger-killers.co.uk, the Coalition of Badger Action Groups (CBAG) called on people to help it stop the cull and said: “As well as campaigning against the cull and raising awareness of it, we also aim to stop the culls using direct action.

“We will be out in the fields before and during the cull, stopping and making citizens’ arrests on marksmen/women when we can, filming, rescuing injured badgers and neutralising bait points when we find them.”

The group said it would show that that the cull was ineffective and counter-productive, as well as inhumane and unsafe.

“By rescuing badgers with gunshot wounds, taking them to vets for treatment and filming this process, we will show the world, via YouTube, this coalition government’s inhumanity,” it said.

The group asked people to join night patrols during the cull, claiming that “with high visibility jackets, 1,000,000 candle power torches, megaphones, video cameras and a serious attitude, we can stop this cull”. It said that it was planning its biggest night patrol on Sunday, 29 September.

It also called on people to contact their MPs and organise protests outside local Conservative group offices. “Ultimately it is the coalition government that can stop this cull and we would ask anyone who wants to help stop the cull to put pressure on the government,” it said.

CBAG published the names and addresses of farmers involved in the pilot badger cull on its website last month, causing the NFU to question the security of Defra and Natural England’s systems.